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6
trained in meat inspection. In this manner every carcase can be examined and lay assistance employed
under professional supervision. A clerk will be needed for the keeping of books and the receiving of
fees, a staff of persons employed in the cleaning of the premises, and the necessary service for the engine
of the cooling room.
General conclusions.
The proposals embodied in this report are, therefore—
(а) That as a first step towards providing a satisfactory system of meat inspection the
Council should provide six public slaughterhouses, and in estimating their size I have no
other basis to suggest than the number of animals which are now killed in private slaughterhouses
in London. If this basis be accepted it would be well to acquire sites which would
enable the accommodation to be extended should this at any time be found necessary.
(б) That carcases should be examined in each slaughterhouse by a competent veterinary
surgeon, and that each carcase should be marked in some way that would be evidence of the
inspection. This I believe would not be of less value to the meat vendor than to the meat
consumer.
The question necessarily arises whether the adoption of these proposals would impose cost on
the ratepayers. I am satisfied that every effort should be made to make the slaughterhouses selfsupporting,
i.e., that the fees paid for the use of the slaughterhouses, and the cooling rooms should
cover the capital cost and the cost of administration. It is of course impossible to forecast the result
with any certainty, but I anticipate when butchers have learnt by experience the conveniences which
they will enjoy, both from the use of the slaughterhouses and cooling rooms, that these places will
provide an acceptable alternative for the private slaughterhouses which of course should, when this
alternative has been provided, no longer exist. Already some public slaughterhouses in England are
self-supporting ; where they have failed to be, it is chiefly because the local authorities have no control
over the continuance of private slaughterhouses. Osthoff, in considering the cost of the use of public
slaughterhouses, and of inspection of the meat in relation to the cost of the meat, estimates the additional
cost due to these causes as amounting to about half farthing per lb. of meat.
In concluding this report I ought to point out that the statutory power of the Council to
provide public slaughterhouses needs to be considered, and that with such power should be accompanied
the power to inspect meat killed in the slaughterhouses and to sfee meat unfit for food. This latter
power is now vested in the sanitary authorities and not in the Council. Later, in considering the
steps which should be taken to ensure the inspection of the dead meat brought into London it will be
necessary for the Council to confer with the Corporation of the City of London as to the system which
should be adopted in the Deptford slaughterhouses, the Islington slaughterhouses and the Smitlifield
Meat Market, and as to the private slaughterhouses in the City.
Shirley F. Murphy,
Medical Officer of Health.